


This shaking keeps me steady

by stifledlaughter



Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Auguste Lives, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Magic, Gen, M/M, Past Sexual Abuse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-26
Updated: 2016-09-01
Packaged: 2018-08-11 06:44:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,148
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7880557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stifledlaughter/pseuds/stifledlaughter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"We have word on where Auguste might be held. In the canyons beyond Vask. We cannot send a large party because the terrain is treacherous and unstable for anyone who is not able to protect themselves with magic.<br/>I ask, as my brother saved your life six years ago, that you repay this debt and save his."</p><p>Damen and Laurent travel across their lands to bring Auguste back and restore order to Vere, but trouble brews back in Akielos as well... (Magic-users AU)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't written a chaptered story in... years. Wow. So! Updates will be completely random but I am shooting for 1x a week.  
> I like magic. I like Captive Prince. I combined the two.  
> Also made-up geography for the win! I shifted the maps to fit my storyline.  
> I cannot remember who nicknamed Laurent "Sparrow" but I found it totally adorable and borrowed it. If you know who it was, please note so in the comments so I can credit :D 
> 
> The usual warnings for Captive Prince apply.

When Damianos was a child, the servants would always know when he awoke.

The child, already tall for his young age, would leap out of his bed, feet slamming into the floor as he began his race down to his brother's room, shouting for Kastor to wake up. 

They would then begin their exhausting day chasing the prince around the castle, ensuring he did not spring off a cliff in his eagerness. "He contains all of the energy of this Earth" they would say to each other, seeing the king look down his throne at the children darting around him, playing and laughing. 

It was this way for years, and as the prince grew taller, they began to watch for the signs of magic to emerge, as it always did with nobility. 

They had no need to watch Kastor. Only children of two noble lines produced magic. 

The smallest things startled the family and close servants of Damen, but none of them were ever signs of magic. A day he ran particularly fast- but that was due to strongly energizing drinks the ambassadors from Dasmayia had brought as gifts. He once managed to give a gleeful shout the exact moment thunder crashed in the sky - but a mere coincidence, as it never happened again. They all waited, patiently, curiously, to see how the magic would manifest in young Prince Damianos. 

The day they found out, the two brothers had been battling.

Normally, the bouts were playful, childish, but lately as their training heightened, their swords clashed a little more strongly. 

The clouds had been thick, and the wind whipped through the olive trees that circled the training yards. Several of them fell to the ground but were crushed by the feet of the people crowding around to watch Prince Damianos face off against his brother Kastor. 

Their chitons were stained and grimy with dust and sweat, and it was clear they had been going at each other for a good amount of time now. Damen's eyes sparkled as he lunged forward and managed to make Kastor go on the defensive versus the offensive. Kastor's face was in stark contrast to Damen; the older brother's eyes were steely and narrowed with focus.

They circled, parried, and the clangs of swords were the only noises besides heavy breathing and stifled grunts. 

"Are you ready to yield, Kastor?" shouted Damen, a happy smile on his face as he leap back, easily avoiding a heavy swing. "I can do this all day!" He brashly extended the last word, his youthful attitude and face betraying his still-growing maturity. 

Kastor grimaced and began to fight faster, making more mistakes but hitting hard, much harder than necessary. 

In the time it took for Damen to notice the sweat drop hovering close to his eye and briefly shake his head to shake it away, Kastor seized the opportunity and lunged, sword pointed directly at Damen's heart. 

In the brief second that Damen looked up and saw Kastor, grinning, sword racing towards his chest, something splintered up in his body, a shock, like his body was going to crack in half, and he froze, not shocked by the sword but by the triumph, the sheer _triumph_ in Kastor's eyes. 

"My Prince!" screamed one of the guardsmen nearby, who lunged forward, and Damen was still in shock, the sword was coming at him but at the same time not reaching him, how, how was this possible-

And he realized that the ground beneath had begun to give way, crack, and he was thrown backwards and Kastor was shoved back, his arm still outstretched, the sword pointed at his brother as the earth tore them away from each other.

The guard managed to grab Damen and yank him out of the crumbling earth that shifted and sank, huge chunks of the ground sticking out of the earth, other parts caved in. 

The radius of the sinking earth had only been in the area directly below where Kastor and Damen had been fighting, and luckily none of the onlookers had been affected. 

"Did you see that?" clamored one of the kitchen boys who had snuck away from duty to watch. "The prince made the ground dance!" 

"Shattered the training yard more like it," muttered a bricklayer who had been watching. 

"Our Prince, an Earthshaker," said one of the scribes in amazement, shaking her head. "What a day..."

"Someone fetch the king!" shouted another, and Damen knew that he should be happy, that he should be ecstatic. His powers had been discovered, he was a man now, and he could start his lessons to control them, use them for Akielos and glory for the empire.

But all he saw, across the cracked earth, was Kastor, still gripping his sword, his mouth twisted in fury, jealousy building in his dark eyes. 

 

\------------

 

Prince Auguste and Prince Laurent were often seeing sitting together on the ramparts of the castle in Arles. The two brothers, blond heads leaning against one another as they looked over the lands they would one day rule, would spend hours on the roof of the castle. 

Prince Auguste had been slow to gain his powers. It was perhaps that he had not survived any event that would have sparked his powers into being, or that he felt sufficiently protected by his prowess with the sword. At 17 years of age, Auguste should have had his powers, but as long as the king still lived, no one was overly concerned. It would come. 

Every two years, a delegation of nobles from Akielos came by to settle any disagreements and do general political upkeep. This time, the royal boys had joined the delegation to expand their knowledge of the other countries in the land. 

The Akielon delegation had met below to make the official arrangements and go through the protocol, but Prince Damianos had found it much too boring. Weeks spent on a boat had made him restless. He began to scale the wall, hearing the voice of Prince Auguste far above him. They had briefly met at other delegation meetings, and had made a strong connection with his fellow prince. He had also seen Prince Laurent, but the younger boy's nose had been in a book the entire time, except for occasional glances up at the chatting (and sometimes friendly sparring) older boys. 

He scaled the wall, and came upon the two princes, who did not seem overly fazed by the sudden arrival of another young man. Auguste detached himself from Laurent and headed over to Damen, but Laurent stayed put. 

"We saw you climbing up when you went around the ivy patches," said Laurent primly, glancing over Damen's clothes. "You've got green all over your chiton, you know."

Damen looked down and grinned. "Did you see me when I almost fell but grabbed onto the gargoyle?"

"That was great!" crowed Auguste, his eyes shining. "I bet I could do it without slipping though."

Damen took a step forward. "Bet'cha can't."

Laurent glanced between the two, his blue eyes darting back and forth. His hands gripped his book that he had been holding a little more tightly. 

Auguste peered down the wall. "We start at the bottom. First one to the top without slipping wins. You slip and fall, you lose."

Damen thrust out his hand, a wide grin on his face. "We'll see about that."

They shook, and as Damen started down the stairs that led to the courtyard he had escaped political niceties from, Laurent grabbed the end of Auguste's dress jacket. "Auguste, it's not safe. Please don't go." 

Auguste laughed. "How many times have I climbed that wall? I'm going to be fine, little Sparrow." 

Laurent's eyes flitted between Damen descending the stairs and his brother. Auguste's hair was whipping about in the wind, and the golden tendrils caught the light in a way that mesmerized Laurent - his brother looked so full of life, and he feared that after this wall-climbing challenge, he wouldn't be.

"Please, Auguste," whispered Laurent. 

Auguste leaned down and kissed the top of his brother's head, patting his shoulders. "Watch me win this for Vere, Laurent. I'll make you proud."

Laurent watched after his brother, his body freezing up, barely able to follow them down the stairs. 

The delegation had moved a bit away, and they were mostly out of sight of the adults. Several of the lesser nobility's children were watching, as well as Kastor. Damen shifted his shoulders, stretching them from his earlier climb. He glanced over at Auguste, who was looking at the wall, cocking his head and smiling over at Damen. They were four years apart in age, but got along quite well, and according to their ruling parents, seemed promising as future rulers of allied countries. Damen had written to him after he had gained his powers, and Auguste had written back in excitement that he couldn't wait for his magic as well, and hoped it would be as exciting an event as Damen's awakening.

Laurent hung back, his eyes wide and terrified as he surveyed the scene. 

The two young men grabbed onto the wall, looked at each other, and then immediately started to climb, scrambling up as bits of torn ivy and some of the looser crumbles of rock fell to the ground. 

At this point, one of the adults had noticed some activity going on and gasped, "Prince Auguste! Prince Damianos! You must stop this-" but halted as King Aleron snapped, "Auguste! What are you doing? Come down!"

Auguste paid no mind but continued to scramble up, calling out to Damen, "You're a few steps behind there, Damen!" 

Damen, distracted, turned his head- and slipped, his hands gripping a thinner vine than he had anticipated, which snapped. He shouted in shock, racing to grab onto anything - he heard shouting below, panicked, and looked down, the ground rushing as he saw Kastor who did not look scared or alarmed, why did he look - _ecstatic  -_

"No!" cried a voice from behind Damen and suddenly, everything stopped-  his fall, his movement, everything. He held in the air, as if he was being buffeted upwards by hundreds of small, whirling hands, and then he realized, he was hovering. Auguste hung onto the wall with one hand, but his other was outstretched, seemingly to grab Damen. 

Shocked, Damen stared openly at Auguste as he was slowly lowered to the ground, the feeling of the hundreds of tiny breezes and winds grasping him and protecting him as he came down. Auguste started to clamber down with significantly more caution than he had before, jumping down the last few feet, his tanned face blanching. "Damen - are you okay - I - I've never done that-"

"You got your magic," said Damen, gripping his fellow prince's hands, "You saved me - I won't forget it, that was amazing Auguste -"

By this point the delegation had run over, and in his joy and amazement over seeing his son's magic manifest, King Aleron completely forgot to scold his child for starting this entire affair in the first place. 

Laurent, who had with immense panic watched the entire affair, ran over to Auguste, grabbing him in a strong hug, although his head barely bumped the center of Auguste's chest. "Auguste! You've got wind magic! You're a Galemaker!" In all of his stories from nobility past, the Galemakers were the ones that had struck him as the most captivating, and he wondered, for a moment, if he too would be a Galemaker one day. 

As Auguste was congratulated and some sighs of relief were exhaled that _yes, the crown prince was indeed magic-capable, it just took some time,_ Damen turned and saw that Kastor had disappeared. He saw a likely corner of the courtyard that turned into an alley, and ran over to it, glanced around, and saw the flash of someone turning away. 

"Kastor!" he called out, running, and nearly ran into his brother as he turned a corner. 

"Go back to your friend and play with _magic_ then," snarled Kastor. 

"Kastor, don't be mad. It's okay you won't have magic. You're still really good with a sword, and you help father with the maps and -," said Damen, trying to grab his brother's hand ,but Kastor yanked it away. 

"Don't touch me." 

Damen stepped back, shocked, hurt, and his stomach curling in on itself. "What?"

"Just... leave me alone." With that, Kastor turned and went deeper into the alleyway, leaving Damen stunned behind. 

"Damen!" called out Auguste from the crowd, Laurent clinging to his waist. "Where'd you go?"

The young prince turned back to look at the crowd, and then glanced back. Kastor was nowhere to be seen.

 


	2. Letters

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for the reviews, guys, and the note that "Sparrow" comes from Fayhe's ficlets :) (Also The Prancing Pony Inn is an homage to Tamora Pierce's works (but it's been years since I've read them I could be wrong, lol.)

_Six years later_

Letter in hand, Damen headed towards his father's chambers.

His father was ill. Slowly, surely, getting more sick. The nobles were still unsure that Damen could take the throne - he could hear their whispers as he crossed through the palace to reach his father's chambers. Kastor, as usual, was there, gripping his father's hand and talking.

“Father, are you feeling better?” asked Damen as he came into the room, kneeling down instantly at the bedside.

His father looked up at him, warm brown face now pale and drawn. “In all honesty, no.” His voice was weak, wavering.

Damen looked up at Kastor.“Any word from the physicians?”

Kastor shrugged. “Nothing new.”

Damen hesitated to tell his news, but decided that there wasn't a better time to do so than now. “Father, Kastor, I've received word from Vere. King Auguste has gone missing.”

“Run away from the responsibilities of the throne now that his father has died?” sneered Kastor.   
King Theomedes ignored Kastor and instead demanded, “When did this happen?”

“Less than a day ago. They sent their fastest messenger.”

“Does the populace know?”

“No,” said Damen, “His uncle, the Regent, has taken his place for the moment saying the king is away on political business.”

Theomedes furrowed his brow. “The uncle that was sent away to Acquitart around three or four years ago?”

Damen nodded. “He's returned up to Arles in the meantime.”

Kastor was watching this back-and-forth and interjected, “And of the smaller brother? The scrawny one?”

“Laurent is working on maintaining order in Arles. He was the one who wrote the letter.”

Theomedes nodded. “This knowledge stays in this room, my sons. Kastor, you need to attend the Council meeting for me. This information does not go to them. Damen, put the troops in Ios on alert. Patras and Vask may take this as an opportunity to attack our allies.”

Damen nodded and grasped his father's other hand. “It will be done.”

Kastor and him stood and left the room to attend their princely duties.

————————-

The next day, another letter arrived. Damen took it to his room and read it swiftly.

_Damen,_

_We have word on where Auguste might be. In the canyons beyond Vask. We received a ransom letter with his pin attached. We cannot send a large party because the terrain is treacherous and unstable for anyone who is not able to protect themselves with magic._   
_I ask that, as my brother saved your life six years ago, that you repay this debt and save his. Come with me to this place and retrieve my brother with me._   
_If you agree to this, I will meet you in the Prancing Pony Inn in Delpha in four days. Come disguised- it would not do for our enemies to learn it is just us that travel to find Auguste._

  
_Laurent_

Damen and Laurent had not spoken overly much since they last were together the time Auguste's magic was revealed. Soon after that, King Aleron had fallen to a stray arrow in an ambush during a trip back from visiting one of the further out provinces of Vere, and Auguste was inducted in a hasty coronation.

Damen and Auguste had written letters every few months or so, in code, to keep the other abreast of the political maneuverings of the court. Since his father had died soon after his magic was revealed, Auguste mostly stayed put in Arles ruling as Laurent backed him with his research and political savvy. Damen therefore never got a chance to get close to Laurent, who apparently developed his magical powers when he was the young age of 13, unlike his brother. Auguste had not mentioned what incident sparked Laurent's powers into being, simply that he had them now and he had begun training.

Damen sat back on his bed, letter lightly crumpled in his hand. He did owe Auguste the debt, and while his father was ill, Kastor could hold the politics of the kingdom steady, and Nikandros, his right-hand-man, could maintain the troops. He had a number of good men and women to watch his kingdom as he did this. And, in general, it was the right thing to do. Auguste was a good man. Vere needed him.

He took a quill and parchment and began to write back. He would meet Laurent in Delpha and begin their quest to retrieve Auguste.

———

“You shouldn't be doing this,” said Nikandros, his voice low as he held out Damen's cloak for him to wear. “It'll be a trap.”

“Regardless, Laurent and I can handle it.” Damen slung his rations bag onto his horse and secured his hidden weapons in the leather of the saddle, fingers catching on the handles of the knives he had there.

“You haven't even seen the boy since before he could grow a beard. You have no idea how useful he actually is in battle.”

“If the reports of his magic use are true, he will back me in battle.” Damen turned to face Nikandros. “You have my troops, Kastor and my father have the kingdom. I will return after leaving Auguste and Laurent at Arles.”

Nikandros gripped Damen tight in a hug likely not appropriate for a soldier to his prince, but neither of them said anything.

The Prince, wrapped in a heavy cloak to obscure his form, set off before dawn with his horse and weapons.

————

The Prancing Pony Inn was a middling bar - certainly not where the lords and ladies of Delpha spent their time, but there rarely was blood drawn during the occasional brawls. Often they were the young, scrappy men and women who hadn't gotten into the military and were rustling to show themselves than actual violent fighters.

The liveliness and commotion of the Inn was likely why Laurent had chosen it. In all of the hustle in bustle, and just lowly enough that often princes would not dare set foot in it, they would likely not be recognized. From what Damen remembered and what Auguste had reported to him throughout the years, Laurent had a keen memory and often did his own research of the goings-on in the kingdom, sometimes in disguise. Damen had found it curious but the method seemed to work for Auguste, who always had the most up-to-date information on his kingdom and held Laurent in high esteem as his right-hand-man.

Slipping in the door behind several Vaskian women, he peered around. There was an upstairs too, which he suspected Laurent picked. Less travel, less movement than the bottom floor. Fewer people to suspect who they were.

He headed up the stairs, keeping his head down. The closer they got to the mountains, the colder it got - he layered on more and more as he traveled away from Ios, which was, for this time of yea,r already chilly to him.

There were a good amount of people there, but few that were sitting alone. He scrutinized them, looking for blond hair and blue eyes, but none fit the bill.

Perhaps the Prince was late? Delayed on the road? Decided not to come? Or this was a trap all along, set up to begin a war between the two allied countries? Although that would benefit no one...

Damen was deep in thought when he startled by a tap on his shoulder. He turned and saw a singularly stunning young man. Bright blue eyes, shining and soft blond hair, and skin that looked achingly soft to touch. Damen forgot words, he forgot what he was doing, he forgot who he was even looking for just taking in the person in front of him.

“Looking for someone special tonight, sweetheart?” asked the man coyly, whose mannerisms and clothes screamed that he was more expensive than any other in the tavern but most definitely worth it. Diamondlike earrings shimmered as the courtesan tilted his head, smiling invitingly, but with slightly too much bite to be a true....

And then Damen realized, the thought slamming into him like a runaway merchant's cart - Is he Laurent?!

Nothing about him seemed the same but as Damen continued to stare, he saw the familiar flicker of intelligence in Laurent's eyes, and how they constantly darted about, assessing the situation.

“Y-Yes,” stammered Damen, and then quickly got into the role. He motioned towards a table being vacated, off to the corner, letting Laurent head towards it first. Laurent falsely smiled, the cheer of someone about to make a solid amount of income plastered on his face. Damen noted from the looks of the other patrons that Damen was envied for being chosen as a customer- in certain areas of Ios, it was more common for courtesans to choose their potential clients, and one who would have looked like Laurent would be in high demand indeed. Although, mused Damen cynically, half of the concept behind that was the customer feeling somehow “chosen” or “special” and then more willing to pay the higher prices these courtesans demanded.

Laurent slid gracefully into the scarred and battered chair, even managing to make the shuddering of the legs as they unevenly wobbled into an elegant action. “I've reserved a room- you pay downstairs, we take our time in the room-” and Laurent's eyes coyly ran up and down Damen's form, his voice a little loud for a private conversation. “-and then end the night on a good note. How's that sound for you?” His voice was sweet, honeyed, and Damen could almost feel the envy of the men and women sitting around him.

“Ah - yes. Excellent.” Damen was still shocked that this young man was what had become of little, bookish Laurent - but he also knew that there must be a reason why Laurent was doing this. Auguste spoke nothing but praise of Laurent's intellect and cunning, so Damen felt it best to run with it and hope he could keep up.

They went downstairs, paid the bill (and politely laughing at the “This one will lighten your purse, he will, eh?” from the innkeeper) and headed up to the room, Damen careful to note if anyone was trailing them.

Seconds after Damen closed the door, Laurent's demeanor changed to aloof and businesslike.

“I need to see your maps. Plans have changed. We haven't got much time.” With that he unclipped the earrings and tossed them into the fireplace. Damen startled- but perhaps they were just cheap yet well-polished glass earrings. Or, Laurent was a bit spoilt. One of the two. He then started to fuss with the kettles and teapots that were available in the cupboard near the bedside.

Damen started to unload the maps from his bags, asking, “So we're on for tea then?”

Laurent glanced up disdainfully at Damen. “We're not staying here more than five minutes, tops. But we need people to think that we're still here in fifteen, twenty, and more.”

“Then...” and then it clicked in Damen's head. “The noise from the kettles.”

“Putting them at different levels of water will make them scream at different times.” Laurent continued to pour water from the bathwater buckets. He gave them cursory measuring glances, and when he was satisfied he stepped back. “Good. We have likely seven minutes until the first one starts to scream. It'll run out of water about ten minutes before the next, and then the next, and by then we're well out. You need to be tracking a new path around the mountains - bandits were spotted yesterday through the main throughway and ambushed a merchant caravan. We can't risk that alone.”

Damen nodded and began to trace a new path on the map, noting how they ended up going along of the river into the deeper, colder areas of the mountains. “It'll be too rough of terrain for horses at some point.” Damen couldn't see what Laurent was doing behind him, but it sounded like he was stacking and shifting heavy items and setting them up precariously. “What are you-”

“Back to the map,” snapped Laurent. “We haven't got more than a minute before we need to run out of here. The stablewoman woman I paid off below will only hold our horses below the window for two minutes more.”

Sure enough, when Damen glanced down, a bored-looking woman was holding both his and what he assumed was Laurent's horse.

Laurent finished whatever he was doing and came over, and Damen had noticed he had slid on some clothes over the revealing garments he was wearing earlier. “Care to explain why you were dressed like that?”

Laurent snorted derisively as he traced the path with his fingers. “Barfolk let their tongues loosen when they think no one of importance is listening. You won't believe what I heard about the scandal going on at the Rose Estate in town. And of course no one questions why I was there for so long when they think I'm just picking out the right client.”

With that, Laurent scooped up the maps, quickly rolled them and slid them in a bag that had been hidden somewhere on his person under the scant clothing (Damen was quickly becoming more and more enthralled with Laurent's... resourcefulness).

It was hard to reconcile the small, bookish, narrowed-eyes boy that he had last seen when Auguste's powers had revealed themselves with this confident, goal-oriented and well-developed man. Damen wondered, briefly, selfishly, how Laurent saw him and how he compared to his younger self. Laurent should be... nineteen or twenty at this point, Damen surmised, basing it off of his knowledge of Auguste's last name-day celebration he was invited to but regretfully could not attend.

Laurent peered down the window and then looked back at Damen. “If you drop down, will it kill you? Being a fairly large barbarian and all you could take the hit.”

Damen took the insult in stride - Laurent definitely did not have the charm that Auguste had - leaned over, checking the distance. “At this height? I'm better of climbing down than jumping.” With that he started out the window, and began to slowly maneuver his way down. The woman handed him the reins of the larger horse and then flicked her eyes up. “Aren't you two an odd pair then. Sneaking behind your lovers' backs?”

“What? No- I -” but then he realized, it was the perfect cover. “Ah, well, you know how it is.” Even saying that wretched him, but if Laurent was in disguise, he realized he needed to be as well.

She raised an eyebrow. “None of my business if I get coin. Better watch yourself though. Any lover of his would be after you if they found out. Pretty face like that?” She stopped talking as Laurent reached them. She handed him the reins, and he gave her the rest of her coin, and she was off in the night back to the stables.

They mounted and left the town quickly, Laurent constantly keeping an eye behind him as they left the sprawl of the city and entered the rolling hills that housed tiny villages. They skirted around them but clung to the edges, never going through but keeping close enough to benefit from the lights and noises.

They kept mostly silent - Damen had many questions for Laurent, but knew that Laurent was hyper-focused on getting this done to save Auguste and couldn't really care any less about sating Damen's curiosity about the goings-on in Vere and rumors of why the Regent had been exiled to Acquitart. He understood that as Princes of, yes, allied but definitely very different kingdoms that they both had secrets to hold back, in case war did ever break out again.

It was, surprisingly, Laurent who broke the silence, about two hours into their ride.

“If Auguste had not saved your life, would you still be coming on this rescue?” Laurent's voice was even and measured as he expertly swung his horse around scattered rocks that were becoming more prevalent as hills turned to tundra landscapes.

“Yes,” answered Damen honestly and instantly. “I know he and I haven't seen each other in years, but I consider us friends. Our kingdoms rely on each other for strength.”

“So you're doing this purely for Akielos?”

Damen was wondering where all of this was coming from. “Well, partially. But Auguste is a good man. And a strong one. Whoever took him poses a threat to other people as well.” Something made him pause. “Did you ever hear anything about who-”

But his words were cut off by the scream of an arrow by his face, and immediately he sprang into battle mode, hand to his short sword that he had on his horse, looking to where the arrow had come from.

“They shouldn't have come out this far,” muttered Laurent, glancing up at the dark shapes in the distance. Three, maybe four of them, on horses. Bandits.

“Think they know who we are?” asked Damen lowly, urging his horse to turn so as to not get hit in the face.

“Likely not or there would be more of them,” replied Laurent.

They got closer, and Damen could tell they were readying their bows again. “Okay, I'll drop a trench in the ground - cut it out right from under their feet. Should injure their horses, maybe even have them fall on each other, that should give us time to -”

But before Damen could finish, a thick wall roared up in front of him, and turned to see Laurent, hands out, murmuring words as they became slowly surrounded, circled by a huge ring of impenetrable ice.


	3. Protected

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Guys I'm not gonna lie if you want highly structured, sense-making magic, you're not gonna find it here. Please roll with me as I do the Crocodile-wrangling storyteller technique and finding a cool idea and wrasslin' with it. 
> 
> Also thanks to @MissTako for beta-reading it!

Damen reeled back, stunned as the wall around him grew, encasing them as the bandits either barely stopped or slammed into the wall as they tried to halt their charge.

He knew it was dangerous to break a magic user's concentration as they were finishing their work, so he restrained his words until Laurent opened his eyes and lowered his hands. The younger prince calmly said, “Yes, drop the trenches now. Make it deep enough to kill. We can't have them getting out saying the princes are out on their own. Since it'll be obvious it was us and whatnot.”

Damen, still stunned by the sheer display of power he had just witnessed, gaped slightly like a fish until the sharp clang of sword on the wall shocked him out of his haze.

“Drop them,” repeated Laurent, a smirk starting to twist at the edge of his lips. He knew Damen had been completely unaware of the depth of his power.

Damen turned and through the cracked-glass-like ice could see where the bandits were, one of them violently and futilely smashing against the thick ice wall. Focusing on the ground beneath them, he willed it to drop, sink them deep, trap them, feeling that coursing energy rush through him and loop back to the earth,

The ground groaned, collapsed, and settled, with the men and women clawing at the edges of the trenches, horses screaming and whinnying. Only the one who had belonged to the man who had directly attacked the wall managed to escape, galloping at full speed away from the wreckage.

“Give it ten minutes. Hopefully they've punctured their lungs.” Laurent, who had barely broken a sweat calling that immense amount of magic to the surface, leaned back against one of the sides of the wall and appraised the scene through the hazy sheet of ice.

Damen found the words he had been looking for. “I had not been told you were so strong in your magic.”

Laurent smirked. “The pretty prince who plays politics doesn't have any particularly strong magical powers. It all went to the older brother, so I heard.”

“So you hide it.”

“Most of the people at the castle know. The rest of the country has no reason to know. If Auguste can defend them with tornadoes, the prince that can make ice sculptures doesn't seem as impressive.”

“I hardly call this a sculpture. The ice is at least two fists thick.” Damen couldn't lean against it- the ice seared his skin. Outside of the wall he could hear the groaning and slow dying of the bandits. Better they die now than after they hurt innocent civilians and ran around telling the news of the royal princes out on their own.

Damen's horse, nervous at being so enclosed after all of the excitement, whinnied and started to back up. Damen shushed her, making sure she didn't kick out or alarm Laurent's horse, who seemed oddly accustomed to this. No doubt Laurent had trained extensively with this horse, and probably several others, so not scare easily.

“It's getting to be night. We might as well camp here anyway,” commented Laurent mildly as the last of the dying groans had stopped.

Damen admittedly did feel better being surrounded by the wall, and the ice was slick enough that climbing it would be either very noisy or nearly impossible.

Laurent pressed his hands against one of the walls (Damen had just noticed how they were flat and angled when the younger prince did that - five angles, to be exact, within the ice ring) and it melted beneath his hands, collapsing back into the ground, and then the water fading.

“Can you control the water in its liquid state?” asked Damen, staring curiously at what should have been an immense amount of water beneath where the section of the wall had been.

Laurent was expanding his wall, making the ice encircle a larger area for the horses. After finishing that, he paused, catching his breath, and then turned to Damen. “No. I can collapse the ice and make it return to the air, but I don't believe, without a significant amount of ice present in a body of water, that I could control the water as well.” Laurent paused, his head tilting very slightly. “Can you control sand?”

“Not terribly well,” admitted Damen, who had once gone on trip of goodwill to Dasmayia to see their kingdom, and remembered being frustrated with his powerlessness there in the wide sweeping sands. “The deserts, with the ground that is cracked and dry, yes, and anything built by man that can be broken, but sand... it's already so broken. I can't shift it.”

“And should the ground be covered in heavy layers of snow?”

Damen noted the look in Laurent's eyes as he cataloged and filed this information away in his mind, like a librarian amongst a pile of scrolls. He realized that Laurent was finding out how strong Damen's powers really were and if they could end up saving Auguste.

“Still moveable. The weight on top of the ground doesn't matter. I can move the ground beneath mountains, it's how wide an area is that saps my power. When I tried to collapse and turn a farmer's field when I just got my powers, I had to lie in bed for a week after.” Damen remembered his foster-mother Hypermenestra's fretting about him, and how she stayed by his bed the entire time. His father scoffed at her worry, but since she wasn't a magic-bearer she didn't understand how it affected him. “I've destroyed myself and come back, again and again,” said Theomedes, ruffling Damen's hair. Damen had smiled up weakly at his father. Hypermenestra only pursed her lips and fetched Damen more water.

Now that he thought about it, Damen realized he couldn't remember if Kastor had visited him in the physician's wing or not.

Laurent, seeming satisfied with the answer, turned and began to set up his half of the camp, making sure to feed his horse and murmur to her gently.

Damen had rarely been alone with Laurent when they had been visiting on their respective diplomatic meetings. He noted how the prince was as tightly laced as his impeccable riding boots (something, Damen noted wryly, no casual traveling rider would wear, but Laurent was finicky like that). Casting a glance around at the wall structure surrounding them, he noted how sharp the angles were, measured almost, and how precise everything was.

“So you're an Ice Mage. Curious how that never came up in Auguste's letters.” Damen had suspected, perhaps, that Laurent had been gifted with a rather simple or harmless power, like producing light or being hyper sensitive of hearing and sight, and it went by unnoticed since he was not destined for the High Throne anyway.

“I told him not to write about it. The less people know about my powers, the more of the element of surprise we have should someone attack the castle.”

Damen began to attend to his own horse, musing on the other Ice Mages in royal history. “Did you study the works of Queen Elsa of Vere? I remember reading about her castles she made from ice.”

“Somewhat,” replied Laurent, now setting up his bedding. “Most of my studies were focused on what she studied, the geometry and patterns of ice. Knowing the basics of those formations were what I needed to be more exact in my creations.” Laurent's eyes flickered over to Damen. “It's more precise than destroying giant pieces of land, anyway.”

Ah, talking to Laurent is still like trying to hug a porcupine. “I'll give you that I never formally studied how to break the ground, but I did study the geography of different soils and ground types in order to know how much power to throw into my magic. Overspend the magic and you can wreck the land for leagues and cause aftershocks, permanently rendering the entire area unstable.”

“Which was the downfall of King Lance in the early reign of the Brotherhood Era.” Laurent had rolled out his sleeping linen and began to settle into it. “He was the last Earthshaker before you.”

“Someone's read up on their magic history.” Damen had rolled out his bedroll a decent distance from Laurent and settled in. It was a clear sky overhead, with the moon shining down on them. It glinted off of the ice. Even though it was night, the moon shining and reflecting off of the wall made Damen feel covered in a shimmering haze of light. He glanced over at Laurent, who was facing the opposite direction. His blond hair was shining, tinged a cool blue by the ice and moonlight.

There was no response from Laurent. Damen, suddenly feeling weighed down and exhausted by the day, fell asleep.

——-

In his dream, Damen was in a court - but not Ios. Instead the sprawling and elaborate art and gold leaves on the walls of the huge, cavernous hall led him to believe that he was in one of the castles of Vere. He couldn't be sure of which one, as they all blended together for him, but it most definitely was not Akielon and likely not Patrasian or Vaskian. It felt oddly abandoned, eerie somehow.

He walked down the hall, his footstep echoes swallowed up by a gentle tinkling noise, like tiny gemstones clicking together. He followed the source of the sound, but was stopped by a door blocking his path. He tried to open it, but the elegant golden handle wouldn't move. He briefly considered shattering the ground beyond the door (something he would never actually do outside of a dream but he figured it was a dream by the fact that he wasn't surrounded by jabbering Veretian courtiers) but before he could summon the energy, a small, angry voice stopped him.

“Who are you? Why isn't he here?”

Damen whirled around to face a young boy, his skin still smooth and unmarred by a beard- but anger distorted what would have been a lovely, sweet face surrounded by coppery red curls.

“Get out! Or I'll make you!”

“I can't,” said Damen blankly, caught in the odd haze of knowing he was in a dream but strangely feeling that, if need be, this boy could follow through on the threat.

The boy growled in frustration and threw his hands out and blasted Damen back, and Damen no longer had to be concerned that the door wouldn't open - he blew right through it. Slamming into the wall, Damen quickly tried to right himself, but realized he had crashed onto something soft and warm. He scrambled back and realized the collapsed, weak heap he was next to was a person.

Quickly he rolled over and crawled towards the person, grabbing them by the shoulders and hauling them up. Thick, long blond hair was in front of the person's face. Damen pushed it out of the way to see the man behind it coughing, looking up with glazed, hazy blue eyes, which widened as he croaked, “Damen?”

Damen didn't have time to get the words out- as he opened his mouth, another blast of wind hit him in the back, and he crashed again into the form, his vision collapsing into darkness as he tried to call out again-

“Auguste!”

He rolled over in his bedroll, grasping at the ground where Auguste would have been.

That wasn't a normal dream. There was something magical about it- but Auguste wasn't the one using wind powers, but the boy had. Was there another prince? A Patrasian one? Perhaps the bastard child of two nobles sneaking behind their spouses' backs, cast off due to the shame that Vere had for children born out of wedlock?

He turned immediately to Laurent, to wake him, to tell him of what he saw - but saw that Laurent was covered in a thick, glossy sheet of ice. Every inch of the prince was completely blanketed, completely enclosed, as if the ice had crept over the young man and shielded him.

Damen had no idea what to do. Poke him with his sword? Gently toss a rock over? Shout Laurent's name and hope he could hear through the ice?

But before he needed to figure that out, he saw that the ice was melting off of Laurent. The ice became thinner and thinner, cracking and sloughing off, and as there were still pieces disappearing on his skin Laurent turned to Damen and said lowly, dangerously, “Is there a reason you were shouting Auguste's name in your sleep?”

Damen stammered out, “I saw him - in my dream - why are you covered in ice-”

“If you are having these kind of dreams about my brother I'll ask you to keep your voice down,” said Laurent in a dangerously calm tone. “And if you're only on this rescue mission to somehow beholden my brother to wed you, I suggest you take your horse and go back to Ios where you can kindly-”

“It's not like that,” Damen said, flushing as he was getting distracted Laurent's heated gaze on him. “I saw Auguste, but there was this boy there too - he was using wind powers, and he kept shouting that I didn't belong there-”

Laurent's face, for the briefest moment, betrayed alarm, but shifted back to calm arrogance. “Was this boy young? Redhead? Seemingly crueler than his face would suggest?”

“Yes, exactly, who is he? If there was a magic wielding noble out there who could use that kind of strength and power, we would know about that.”

“You didn't know about me,” noted Laurent smugly.

“Not the point. Another Galemaker besides Auguste right now? That's something concerning. Especially that young.”

Laurent looked down, and Damen could tell his thoughts were racing, calculating, thinking. “Nicaise doesn't have any magical powers. He channels them. He's a magical siphon - rare, but it happens.” Laurent began to created small shapes of ice in his hand, forms of geometry that shifted and slid over his slim fingers. Damen, for a moment, envied that type of power- he knew his mother could do the same with plants, and could hold a product of her power and cradle it. He never could.

“We were in this - I think it was a castle, one of the decorated ones, but I don't think it was the main one at Arles.”

“I think I know where it was,” said Laurent. “And if Auguste is there, it's not in the mountains. That was a ruse.”

“Wait wait. What if this was just a dream? How do we know if this makes any sense?”

Laurent began to pack up his bags, and Damen noticed he was also lowering the walls at the same time. “That wasn't a coincidental dream. Nicaise was trying to reach me and somehow got to you instead.”

“Reach me? What? Is he a telepath? What about the wind powers?”

“He isn't a telepath. Like I said, he's a siphon. He can take the powers of the people around him and channel them. But he's young and if he doesn't know exactly what he's doing, the magic takes its own path, and this time it decided to channel to you instead of me. He must have been really desperate to get the word to me that he couldn't control his emotions and because I've built up mental guards against telepathy, it bounced off and channeled to you.”

Damen frowned. “What noble in the kingdom has Dreamwalking strong enough to reach us out here?”

Laurent had finished packing and was now focusing on lowering the rest of the walls. Facing away from Damen, Laurent said, coolly, “The Regent.”


	4. Patience and Assessment

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's Nanowrimo! I'm focusing on this story, along with my Star Trek translations this month, so I hope to finish this story by the end of November. Yay goals!

"You're going to have to tell me everything now," demanded Damen as they sped across the sprawling plains, the horses' hooves pounding the ground in a deafening roar. 

 

Laurent was now, if possible, more focused than before, head bent down close to the neck of his horse. "We have to reach the edges of the foothills ahead. The Vaskian tribes are there. We're going to need reinforcements." 

 

"And what makes you think the Vaskians are just going to hand over reinforcements?" said Damen, noting that if they kept at this speed, they would reach their destination within two hours give or take, but he still wasn't sure about this plan. "As far as I know, neither Vere nor Akielos have firm alliance with Vask." 

 

"This is a personal debt to repay." The hooves pounded and pounded as he continued, "When I was visiting the Vaskian high court tribe during spring once, they were experiencing torrential floods. I stayed and froze the waters as they were and kept them from flooding the encampment, and managed to move all of the ice and water to go into their springs and lakes near the grounds."

 

Damen mulled over this new information as they kept riding and approached the camp. The spirals of smoke in the air and heavy scent of cooking meat greeted them as they pulled up closer to the edge, slowing down as the sentries approached. "Let me handle this," said Laurent as the women on horses approached. 

 

One of them, a woman with thick black hair that was loosely bound in several ties over her shoulder, looked them up and down, and then smiled broadly. "Prince Laurent. It has been a long time. The foals you saved have had their own little ones since then." She motioned to one of the horses snuffling around the edge of the camp with a crisp white coat who was trailed by a smaller version of itself, with the frail spindly legs of a newborn.

 

For what may have been the first time since they met for this rescue mission, Damen thought he saw genuine happiness flicker in Laurent's eyes, but it was quickly masked with seriousness. "Kashel, I must speak with Halvik. Debts are to be paid, and fast."

 

Kashel nodded, swinging her horse around and motioning for them to follow. Over her shoulder she called out, "And your strong companion, he follows you?"

 

Laurent snickered and Damen resisted pointing out that, in the grand scheme of royalty, he had more rank that Laurent did, but instead waited for Laurent to reply. "I'll decide what he is after I speak to Halvik."

 

"Can you decide if he is available tonight for my women? We could use some new blood."

 

Damen could barely hold back a splutter at that and summoned all of his strength to not shove Laurent off of his horse as he said, "That too will be decided after I speak to Halvik."

 

Kashel laughed and said, "Surely taking you could not be all that tiring for a beast such as himself! I say he could finish four, perhaps five in one night. I assure you that my women will take the best care of him."

 

"I-" started Damen, who was torn between his pride in being so highly evaluated and his annoyance at being bandied about like a prize stallion, but Laurent cast a freezing glance at him. 

 

"We're here," announced Kashel, who gestured for them to enter the tent. It didn't seem terribly unlike the others but for a fur-lined entrance that likely kept out the cold better than some of the other tents. Damen and Laurent dismounted, Laurent staying by his horse for a few seconds further to check the tack and tend briefly his steed before entering the tent.

 

Damen had visited Vaskian settlements as they had passed through Akielos selling wares and horses, and as a child he had marveled at the strength of the women and how comfortable they were constantly traveling. While he knew that his place was destined to be the throne, sometimes he wondered, privately, how it would have been to have that taste of freedom, roaming as they did. He realized with startling clarity that the first time he had slept under the stars not surrounded by armed guards was last night, feet away from the prince of Vere. 

 

Entering, they saw a strong, chiseled woman poring over thick sheaves of parchment. Another woman was nearby cleaning up. Damen noted her status by the way she used deferential terms to who he assumed was Halvik. The taller woman had many blue and white beads woven into her hair, and by the way she effortlessly commanded the other woman and turned to face Damen and Laurent appraisingly, he knew he was dealing with someone on, if not legally, emotionally the same standing as him. 

 

"It's been a few years, Prince Laurent. I see you're looking well, if a bit small... And your companion is...?" She looked over Damen approvingly, and while Damen didn't sense any disrespect from her towards Laurent due to his stature, he could tell that Halvik was already planning what Kashel had discussed. 

 

"Unimportant for the moment," Laurent said, and Damen bit back another indignant remark. He knew from Auguste's letters that Laurent was skilled at court politics and maneuvering, far more than Damen would admit he was, but it still irked him to be treated as such. 

 

Halvik seemed to know that something was amiss, but chose to ignore it. "Debts to be repaid, I assume?"

 

"Yes," said Laurent. "I'll need several of your scouts to go to the castle at Ravenel and confirm if my uncle is there. As well as a young boy by the name of Nicaise."

 

Halvik frowned. "A small request for a large debt."

 

"I haven't finished my request. I need to see if they are there before I ask for the final one."

 

Halvik nodded. "Of course. We'll send some of them out. In the meantime, you can take over Yarilo and Pamiat's tent. They will be scouting." With a wave of her hand, they took their leave. 

 

"If you know which castle it is, why send the scouts?" asked Damen as they were lead by Kashel to Yarilo's tent. 

 

"If Nicaise saw you, it's possible he'd tell the Regent, who'd then leave for somewhere else. Once we get confirmation they're there, we move on to the next plan."

 

"And if they're not?" 

 

Laurent's mouth twisted slightly, deep in thought. "We wait for Nicaise to try to contact me again."

 

"Could we scout out the Regent with another telepath, or use a telepath to contact Auguste?" Damen had not had much experience with telepaths - from what he could tell, the magical lineages of the differing kingdoms made it so that usually the same magic appeared in the same lines, give or take a few exceptions. He wasn't aware of any telepaths in his court, at least, none that had come out about it. 

 

Kashel dismounted and showed them their tent. It was modest, with a comfy nest of blankets meant for 

 

After a moment of scoping out the tent, Laurent turned to start to unpack one of his bags and answer Damen. "My uncle has built up protections against other telepaths. Auguste's done it too, so we couldn't track him." 

 

"Nicaise?"

 

"Nicaise has my uncle's powers when he siphons them. It'd be useless since he copies the magnitude as well, which includes his shields."

 

"But not the skill. I can tell in my dream. It's patchy, he can't control it all at once or even if he does something. A skilled telepath could presumably catch him in a moment, if scanning consistently, for when he's let down his guards and focusing on another power, like trying to contain Auguste's powers." 

 

Laurent paused his unpacking, and actually put down his satchel to look directly at Damen. "How do you mean?"

 

"I know that for me, when I started using my powers, it took concentration. Now, my body and mind just react together, and it works. That's why your uncle's shields are good - he doesn't need to think about them anymore. But Nicaise only has your uncle's power, not his training, not his habits, and definitely not the learned shields your uncle has probably practiced for years." 

 

Damen watched Laurent's face as he said this. Something changed in Laurent's expression, the idea that he had previously quickly cast aside coming to possibility. Damen continued while he had Laurent interested. "Also, given how uncontrolled the powers are that Nicaise is siphoning, it probably wouldn't be hard for a skilled telepath to pick up on them, especially if he were traveling with us and Nicaise was looking for your mind."

 

"I know a skilled telepath," said Laurent. "I'll send a Vaskian messenger to Patras tomorrow to get him. If we do lose them or they get word we're coming, I'll want him here to track Nicaise down." Damen noticed that when Laurent was dismissive of him, he turned his body away, or only flicked his eyes up to Damen's face while talking versus making eye contact consistently. But now he was looking steadily at Damen, analyzing, trying to figure out something. Damen felt scrutinized and picked apart. 

 

"What debts does this telepath owe you?" asked Damen, seeing now more of the political mastermind that Auguste had peppered hints about in his letters. He realized that Auguste perhaps had wanted Damen to know all along what an intelligent ally he had. 

 

"Nothing yet. But this would be a good test of his loyalty." With that, Laurent finally turned back to his unpacking. "I'll be writing some letters. In the meantime, you go off and try not to announce that you're the heir to the Akielon throne." 

 

Damen snorted. "You think I'll just go stomping off announcing that I'm the crown prince?" 

 

Laurent had settled his parchment and writing tools down on the desk from his bag and didn't even look up as he said. "You don't even need to speak. You carry yourself like someone who ought to be listened to."

 

\--------------------

 

Several hours later, Damen stumbled back from the tents of a handful of women, all of whom were passionate, strong, and knew what they wanted. It something Damen was unused to given his usual partners, but was nevertheless flexible with. Tugging at his hair, his curls tangled immensely from the hands gripping them, he made a mental note to run through them with oil in the morning to attempt to calm them. 

 

"Well you've certainly had an adventure," commented Laurent as Damen came in and blearily tried to undo the ties on his trousers. He had eschewed his usual chiton for standard traveler wear to fit in, but was annoyed at the cords. He had no idea how Laurent dealt with all of the tight laces on his clothes every day. It seemed a nuisance and a cage to Damen.

 

"Kashel did say you had the neck of a swan, if it helps your envy," replied Damen as he tripped over his own legs as he struggled to go towards the bed. 

 

Laurent actually barked out a laugh, a shocking sound from the austere prince. "I assure you. There is no envy to be had here for Kashel's women." 

 

Damen laid down in the bed, noting with a smile the bites and scratches that stung pleasantly on his back and shoulders. "I'm sure the lovers that you've sought out have appreciated your traits." He was buzzed on the passion and energy of the past few hours, and his words slurred slightly as he buried his face deeper into the furs. 

 

The room was quiet for a moment, and Laurent said, in a distant voice, "I've never sought out a lover."

 

"Of course," said Damen. He could hear Laurent shift, perhaps sit up, from across the room. He clarified, "They've always come to you." 

 

Laurent was quiet again, and then said, "Go to bed. Try and get some strength back before the riders return tomorrow." 

 

As Damen fell asleep, he swore he could hear the sound of crackling, falling ice. 

 

\--------------------

 

The riders returned by morning, their horses exhausted and the riders completely without sleep. They reported, yes, there were occupants in the castle: a handful of servants, an older man, a young boy and a small group of soldiers guarding the castle.

 

Upon hearing this news, Laurent came back to the tent and immediately rolled out a piece of parchment and immediately sat down to start sketching out what looked like a palace floorplan. 

 

Damen had been an outside observer this entire time as Kashel and Halvik had worked out the next part of Laurent's request. Laurent had requested several highly trained horsewomen, preferably archers, to accompany them, as well as one of the magic users in the tribe,  a woman who could hear voices from afar as if they were near. He had specifically requested her from all of the other magic users in the tribe. 

 

It wasn't until Laurent had sketched out the palace floorplan that Damen stepped in. "So. Will you finally tell me what you're planning?"

 

Laurent leaned back and waved a hand at the parchment. "We stage an attack in the front - distract the guards. There are only five, and we'll have more than that, and with Vaskian archers, it's sure they will provide adequate distraction. From there, we need to collapse the back wall-  that's where the storage rooms are, so no one will be hurt or better yet, no one will be able to care or hear us unless they were specifically in that room." He was gesturing to each spot as he spoke, his long fingers tracing along lines he'd drawn in the parchment. "From there, we go up to the hall you described- given what you told me in the dream, Auguste is likely in that same door where you fell into."

 

"Tell me how the dream walking works again," said Damen, his eyes scanning the parchment. Something was missing here. A missing element that would make this key and easier. 

 

"It's a replicated image - when you were thrown through the door, it was the dream door. The only things real and affected in the dream are your emotions after.  You can't tell traces of bruises, or cuts, or any physical effects." Laurent's hands trembled as he drew swirls in the parchment over an empty space. The jagged lines soaked into the paper, stained the table beneath. 

 

"So I doubt the real door was knocked down, and that Auguste is likely still in there. Nicaise probably knows you know what's going on but he doesn't know that you're with me, or that you are coming. He wouldn't recognize you as the Crown Prince of Akielos, and likely assumed you were someone who was caught in his telepathic cast. I doubt he told my uncle. And Auguste probably kept quiet too - I figure he didn't tell Nicaise who you were."

 

It clicked, suddenly. Damen took the pen from Laurent's hand, who made a peeved noise. "Let's camp closer to the castle. One night. You and I. You do the ice wall again, but close enough that it'd be impossible for Nicaise to not reach me. From there I can talk to him and get more of a plan going."

 

"I don't trust Nicaise that much," said Laurent. "He's under far too much influence of my uncle."

 

"Then Auguste. Any way we look at it, we need someone on the inside. At least to warn him we're coming, maybe he could provide a distraction. With Ritma, she could hear him whispering to himself or something, as long as he knew we were there and could maybe hear him."

 

Laurent paused as he watched Damen draw lines in the parchment, detailing a way in. "So you're saying we go out camp near the castle, alone, just for the chance that Nicaise will try to contact me again, catch you in the dreamweb, and then you'll find Auguste and talk to him, all the while not causing Nicaise to figure this out and attack you again?"

 

"If we just show up, we have no one on the inside. Auguste being prepared for this and being in on it could turn the tide and keep him safer. Nicaise already knew I was nearby and they're all still there. He's not telling the Regent, and clearly the Regent hasn't been walking in these dreams, or else he'd be gone by now." 

 

Laurent cast his eyes down, thinking. Damen watched his golden lashes shine over his eyes, and he was momentarily lost, captivated. It wasn't until Laurent looked up again and met Damen's eyes, bright and fierce, that Damen was shuttered back into reality. 

 

"Let's do it." 

 

\--------------------

 

They rode out well after dark, the only indication of a fort in the distance the shimmery glow off of the ramparts far off in the distance. They were close enough to arrive within the hour at it, but not enough to be seen from the guards that were surely patrolling the tops. 

 

"Who maintains the castle? There have to be many servants," commented Damen as Laurent began to build the ice wall again, enclosing them and their horses. 

 

"Since it is approaching winter, they've likely gone to tend to the summer castles the nobles live at. There is a basic skeleton crew that's left to maintain it, as the riders saw, but they are taught to keep out of sight and not interfere. I'm not expecting any problems from them."

 

Damen looked around him at the wall of ice. A question he should have asked earlier bubbled to the surface. "Why would your uncle take your brother? He's not next in line for the throne. You are. This doesn't make any sense." 

 

Laurent was brushing his horse, clearly not tired enough to start setting up his bedroll. "I don't expect you to understand Veretian politics. Just know that this was always a possibility and now he has more power on his side, he's taken this chance."

 

"Why is he keeping Auguste alive?" There were so many missing pieces here. When he talked to Laurent, he got the feeling that he was always just behind, as if he was leaping into darkness with Laurent telling him seconds before where the stepping stones were. 

 

"To draw me in to come here." 

 

Damen set up his bedroll, looking through the shining ice at the castle far ahead of them. "Well. Here we are. Until the morning, then."

 

Laurent said nothing and finished setting up his bedroll, and laid down facing the castle. The silence yawned between them, and Damen wondered if he'd see the flicker of happiness or warmth directed at him from the prince. 

 

Minutes passed as he tossed and turned, but then, as the night fell, he dropped into slumber. 

 

\--------------------

 

The same castle. Same hallway. This time, Damen knew what door to go after, heading towards the door and checking the ground beneath. If he could collapse it just enough to crawl underneath and leave, quietly, as opposed to smashing in the door (which felt awful, if last time crashing through the door was any indication of how it would feel to voluntarily do it). Casting glances behind himself, he slowly collapsed the ground beneath the door, compressing the tiles to sink as quietly as possible down. The gentle vibration beneath him shook the door, but not enough to make a significant noise, and eventually a space large enough for Damen (which was significant, but the structure of the doorframe held) emerged, and he crawled under.

 

It was the same room as before, and he saw the huddled shape in the corner, warm blond hair covered and matted. Damen couldn't quite stand up - the room was cramped and small and clearly some kind of closet. He instead crawled over, whispering, "Auguste, wake up. I haven't got much time."

 

The shape stirred, and Auguste hazily opened his eyes. He looked worse than before, and barely choked out a "Damen?" before coughing. 

 

"Auguste, we're coming to get you, but we need to know everything you know about what's going on."

 

"Damen, there's someone else here, came today, he's got powers, he-" he coughed again, and then he heard footsteps outside the door, small ones, and then a high-pitched angry voice, "You got in **again**! Where's Laurent?" 

 

"He can teleport," whispered Auguste, "A Veretian noble boy-"

 

"We're coming tomorrow, there's going to be a Windcatcher, she'll be able to hear things you say even if you whisper them, you have to tell us what's going on-" all of this was nearly drowned out as the door bent and cracked, and Damen felt this sinking pit in his stomach as the ground shook, and he remembered when he was young and out of control with his powers, and what would happen next as the room collapsed-

 

And he woke up, breathing heavily, and turned to Laurent to grab him and shake him awake, but the second his hand touched Laurent's curled up body, it froze, stuck there.

 

Damen tried to jerk back, but the ice started to climb up his arm and freeze him there, and as he struggled to pull away, too shocked to say anything, he heard ice shatter and crack as Laurent slowly sat up, and hoarsely growled in an tired haze, " _No,_ Uncle." 


	5. When the Walls Fell

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello all! This story isn't abandoned! I just focused on other writing projects for a while. :) I still love my magical prince boys!

 

"Laurent, stop! Wake up!" Damen shouted, his hand quickly growing numb and his arm seizing up from the constriction. Like a living being, the ice wrapped around him, snaking up to his shoulders, chest, and beginning to cover his mouth-

The ground rumbled beneath them and ice shattered, and Laurent rolled to the side, gasping and crawling as the grip of the ice broke between him and Damen. 

"Laurent, _wake up_!" yelled Damen who started to build up a earthen wall around himself, as he was backed up against Laurent's ice wall and had nowhere else to go. "It's Damen! Stop it!" 

Laurent's eyes focused, and he shook off the dirt that was now smeared on him. The ground was broken, but not collapsed, so he crawled out of the chunks of earth. As he stood, the ice sloughed off of him and hit the ground, cracking. 

"Did you try to touch me as I slept?" demanded Laurent, furious.

"I was trying to wake you up - I got to Auguste and we have to get to them now, there's a Veretian noble with teleportation powers who arrived today and if we don't get there in time-"

Laurent swore and shook off the rest of the ice. "We don't have time to go back to the encampment. We go now." The ice started to rapidly dissolve around them as Laurent threw his bedroll hastily into a bundle, tied it to his horse, and mounted swiftly. "I'm going, and you'd better catch up."

Damen easily did so and they were off, leaving the wrecked ground behind them as the only sign they were there. 

"We're going to need a better plan than crashing in with our magic and sword," said Damen as they pounded towards the castle, the dawn light spreading its fingers over the sky and illuminating the imposing castle in the distance. 

"Auguste knows we're coming, and if he's in that hallway, you can risk just collapsing the ramparts. They aren't connected to the back where that hall would be, and you can take out the guards that way.'"

"And if Nicaise is there?" 

Laurent, for the first time since Damen had joined him at the inn, looked... _scared?_  "He got some warning that you were coming when you spoke to Auguste again. Hopefully he stays near Auguste in the halls."

"Why haven't I seen your uncle during my dreamwalks? Did you see him in yours?" Damen assumed when Laurent woke up and spoke his to his uncle, he had been seeing him in a dreamwalk, although he was certain Laurent told him he blocked all telepathy. 

"He must be otherwise occupied... which worries me. Nicaise must know he's occupied too, because otherwise he would be more cautious about dreamwalking to find me."

"He seemed insistent to tell you something," said Damen, the castle drawing closer in his vision. They would have to have made a plan and dismounted in less than fifteen minutes. 

"Probably about Aimeric," said Laurent.

"Is that the teleporter?" asked Damen. "How strong is he? Our teleporters can only do one other person at a time." 

"Not terribly strong, if I recall from a few years back. Some nobles just choose not to develop their powers, even if they have them, or develop them to a minimum. Unless he's undergone intense training..." Laurent frowned, and spurred his horse on harder. 

"We still working with the ramparts collapse and just heading in towards the hallway?" Damen was already mentally calculating from what he could see of the ramparts ahead how to exactly take the top down without destroying what was underneath and possibly damaging anyone who was not on the ramparts. A younger him would not have had that level of control, but Damen knew that if he didn't get his powers under control, he was better off not using them. His training had been incredibly focused and strict given the expanse of his powers. 

Already they could see the figures of the night guard waiting for the dawn guard to switch out. Laurent glanced over at Damen, who was focusing on the arches and walls, finding their weak points based on his studies of buildings, and then said, "Can you do it from here?"

Damen nodded. "Give me the word." It felt odd, taking orders from Laurent, who was younger than him and to his knowledge had never seen battle, but something about Laurent commanded respect and attention, and he submitted. 

"Now."

The building shuddered, and cracks spread rapidly up the walls in specific points, collapsing the ramparts forward, pitching the guards headfirst into the ground. The shouts from the guards were swallowed in the rumble of the stone and earth crashing together. 

Laurent veered off to the left, clearly knowing where the hall and where the specific door was that Damen had described to him. Damen heard some of the less-injured guards shouting for help.

There was a side gate but it was heavily fortified, and Laurent swore when he saw it. "They've added more security since then- I knew the locks and systems when I was younger. I could build a staircase up to the top-"

"In ice?" Damen almost laughed if the situation weren't so dire. "Some of us slip on ice, you know." He then focused his energy on the ground beneath the door and collapsed it like he had in the dream, crushing the earth and stone lower and lower until a sizeable entrance was available to them. Laurent glanced at Damen with that look again, the analyzing one that made Damen feel like a picked-apart treatise under a king's eye. 

Leaving the horses tied up outside, they crawled in, Damen noting how he normally made his crawl-spaces Damen-sized versus the noticeably smaller Laurent. The prince easily scampered through the tunnel, and sprang out the other side, looking and already sprinting off to the left by the time Damen clambered out. 

Heading after him, Damen started to recognize where they were from the dreamwalking, the long hallway with mirrors and tapestries. He saw Laurent running over to the door, glancing around to see if The Regent or Nicaise were there. Once he saw no one, he took a step back and looked at Damen, who was running up. "Collapse the ground under the door again," he commanded, and Damen noticed that his voice broke slightly at the end.

Damen nodded and started to do so, but he heard Laurent gasp sharply and turned just in time to jump back as a blast of wind nearly slammed into him, and took out the door, smashing the wood. Laurent leapt inside, completely ignoring the danger Damen was now left to deal with.

Nicaise stood on the other side of a tapestry, clearly having hidden behind it. "Laurent! Come back!" He outstretched his arms, and there was a tornado of wind that sucked Damen forward, the air like grabbing hands as the gusts reached for Laurent who had ran inside to find Auguste. 

"Nicaise, _stop!_ " shouted Damen, now completely ignoring the pretense of hiding from the Regent and Aimeric, wherever they were. "We have to get Auguste out-"

"You're as stupid as your brother is, aren't you?" demanded Nicaise, who was still trying to drag Laurent out of the room, but keeping his distance from Damen. "Auguste told me who you were when we got out of the dreamwalks. You have no idea what's going on, and Laurent doesn't either and I have to _tell him-_ "

There was a gritty, almost sizzling sound and Nicaise turned pale, and the winds blew stronger, and the ground began to quake, and Damen desperately tried to balance it with his powers but Nicaise was too out of control. "Nicaise you have to calm down, you'll collapse the castle!" Dimly from behind himself he could hear the clang and shouts of battle. 

"Can you try and help at _all_ , you barbarian?" snapped Laurent from inside the closet, and he was dragging out Auguste, who was slumped and visibly worse than before. Before Damen could turn to help, there was a crisping, popping noise, and a fine-boned young man with curly dark hair seemed to step out of the middle of the room, slowly appearing and pulling behind him the hand of -

"Uncle," hissed Laurent, and he raised his hand to blast him with ice, but at the last second Aimeric lunged and grabbed Nicaise, and they all shuddered and popped out of existence. 

Laurent snarled, his elegant face twisting in anger, and he allowed himself a moment of breaking fury to curse heartily in Veretian. Damen rushed over to Auguste and easily scooped him up, noting that while he was breathing, it was shallow.  "We're taking him back to the Vaskians, they have healers, and hopefully your Patrasian contact will be able to help us track down Nicaise and Aimeric." 

Damen ran towards the door holding Nicaise, and Laurent sprinted ahead to unlock it from the inside, hearing shouts from down the hall, but also the familiar war cry of the Vaskian women.

"They're here," said Laurent, shoving open the door. "Put Auguste on your horse and let's head to the front, they've probably taken care of the guards." 

Carefully slinging Auguste over the horse, they raced to the front, where the Vaskian women were standing over the bodies of the guards, and several were inside finding the servants who were presumably hiding. 

"Ritma heard you on the winds, that there was trouble, so we came fast," said Kashel, who was leading the women. She then focused on the body slung over the back of Damen's horse, being held steady with one hand by the crown prince. "Ah! Auguste!"

"Do you have any healers with you right now?" demanded Laurent, his eyes steely and focused.

"No, but back at the camp-" and he was off, shouting at Damen, "Come _on!_ "

Damen made sure that Auguste was secured and sped off, racing back towards the camp, the Vaskian women resting behind to take the servants with them.

When they arrived at camp, Damen a few minutes behind Laurent, several healers were ready, some equipped with light magical healing skills, others talented in the learned arts. Damen dismounted and carried Auguste to one of the tents, kneeling to lay him down. Anxiously Laurent hovered above, and eventually was shooed out of the room by the healers, and the princes were relegated outside.

"Nicaise said he had to tell us something," said Damen. "Auguste has to know too but we never got enough time to talk about it."

Laurent's face was stern - outside of Auguste's view, he was back to calculating. "I heard what Nicaise said about your brother- and your father is sick, right?"

"Yes, but my brother has been by my father's side, and I would have heard by now if..." Damen suddenly was seized with cold dread. "Or not. They'd have no way to track where we are." 

"Once my telepath contact arrives, I'll have him reach one of yours in Ios and see what's going on." Laurent began to pace outside, frustrated. By now it was truly morning, and Damen was achingly tired as he had barely slept and had been roused to fight immediately after the dream. 

Laurent noticed Damen hiding a yawn and said, "Go on and sleep. I'm staying with Auguste." 

"You need sleep too. You'll be useless otherwise." 

Laurent shook his head and looked back at the tent. "No. I'll be fine." 

 

\-----------

 

Damen had curled up in the furs of Yarilo's and Pamiat's tent, who had been moved to another tent since Laurent and Damen would be staying longer with Auguste. He had fended off some of the women from the nights before, claiming sheer exhaustion. Collapsing into the furs, he had drifted off into uneasy but dreamless slept.

The dreamlessness disturbed him more than it should - it meant that Nicaise was far out of range. He wondered where they had disappeared to - perhaps Arles. 

He was woken up by the sound of someone entering the tent, and rolled over to see Laurent burrowing into his furs, making a nest.

"Why aren't you with Auguste?" asked Damen, rolling over to face him. 

"The healers ordered me to leave. They said I was adding too much stress to the environment, and that he couldn't heal properly unless I left." Laurent looked... unfamiliar, was the best way Damen could put  it. His face was shadowed and different, held in a way Damen had never seen it before. 

"What happened to him?" asked Damen. "Why wasn't he using his powers?" 

Laurent looked down, and Damen realized that Laurent was so tired, so angry, so frustrated, and so worried for Auguste that he was looking at Laurent's real, unmasked face. "I think my uncle was trying to... take it away from him. Nicaise was copying his powers, like you said, but that doesn't mean that Auguste had use of them. He was too tired to use them, but how Auguste got weaker and weaker so fast, I don't know. Nicaise's siphoning doesn't work based on how strong the other person is, he just copies the essence of their powers and uses it according to how much his body can take."

Damen had heard rumors of people losing access to their powers, whether through illness that sapped all of their strength, or simply never using it for years and years. It was why he still attended regular training every day for his powers, and unless a power was deemed too dangerous for an individual to have, they had to attend schooling for the magic until they decided whether or not to keep it.

But having it removed by someone else on purpose was something else entirely. 

"When Auguste wakes up, we'll know." Damen realized that Laurent's face was inches from his face, and that the long lashes and "elegant swan neck" (thanks were owed to Kashel for that turn of phrase) were still beautiful despite the young prince's strain. But the thoughts of Auguste's sickness and what could be happening back in Ios and Arles clouded his mind, and he shoved his musings aside. 

"And if he doesn't? I can't imagine... who I'd be without Auguste." Something trembled on the edge of Laurent's voice, but before Damen could ask anymore questions, Kashel called into the tent from the outside, "The telepath has arrived!" 

In a flash, Laurent was up, but before he could get to the door, Damen reached out and held onto Laurent's arm instinctively. "You haven't slept in days, at least not well. Let me handle this."

Laurent froze, and snapped, "Don't. Touch. Me." He wrenched his arm away and exited the tent. 

Damen looked at his palm, and felt the faint burn of ice there, stinging, fading, slowly. 

 

\--------------

 

The telepath was an elegant man, a Patran noble who seemed entirely besotted by Laurent. However, he was also very attentive to Auguste, who he also seemed fond of, although perhaps not quite as much as Laurent. 

They crowded into the tent, Damen, Laurent, a healer, and the noble, who introduced himself as Torveld. Auguste was still weakly lying there, alternatively shivering and lying still. 

"May I?" Torveld asked Laurent, who nodded, and the telepath gently rested his hands on Auguste's face, and closed his eyes. 

Damen watched Auguste's face, and saw it twist, grimace, and go through dozens of different expressions of pain. After a few moments, Torveld slowly lifted his hands from the crown prince and turned back to Damen and Laurent.

"We will need privacy for this. It is very sensitive information-" 

Laurent did not even turn to look at the healer. "Leave."

The healer, a smart woman, quickly ducked out.

Torveld took a deep breath and said, quietly, softly, "Prince Damianos, you are here due to a debt you owe Prince Auguste, correct?" 

"Yes, but.... I would have come anyway." Perhaps not the best of judgements, Damen was willing to admit, but he knew that he would have. 

"Auguste understands this, but he wanted you to know, you're needed elsewhere. Back in Ios, your brother - he's taken over the throne." 

"What?" It was as if Laurent had touched him - everything grew cold, iced over, and he felt sick. "My father-" 

"Is dead." Torveld's soft, gentle voice could not mask the bluntness of the words. "I am sorry - but Auguste overheard the Regent and - Aimeric? - discussing it." 

"He's been sick, but- I-" 

"It was treason, Prince Damianos." The words felt fuzzy, distorted, as if Damen was hearing them through a castle wall. "Your brother, Kastor, he's been poisoning your father. The Regent and him have been planning this." 

"They took Auguste to lure Damen away, but they had to know we'd find this out." Laurent, despite hearing all of this news, remained calm. "My uncle wants the throne, and needs Kastor to be King - he's easier to manipulate. He's greedy, powerhungry, and will concede a lot more, like -" 

"Delpha," whispered Damen, horror crossing his face. "He's going to give the Regent Delpha." 

"How did he rid Auguste of his powers?" demanded Laurent. "If he could do it to Auguste, we're all in danger. Auguste is stronger than either of us." 

Damen privately wondered if this was true, but he was lucky he never had to face Auguste on the battlefield. He can't imagine what he would do if he had to. 

"This is where it gets even more treasonous. As you both well know, not using your powers for extended periods of time can sap you of your powers, right?" The princes nodded and Torveld continued. "From what I can tell, they've been weakening Auguste with lack of food and water, and likely some sleeping drugs. But what rid him of his powers so quickly was _time_." 

"He's been gone for a week at most. People lose their powers after years of disuse." Laurent's voice was clipped and angry, as if he was wondering what point Torveld had discussing this.  

Torveld again took a deep breath. "There is a noble in the Akielon court- I believe the name on Auguste's mind was Jokaste. It appears she can control the passage of time within an object or person, speeding up or slowing down the natural rhythm - ah, Prince Damianos? If I may, I can hear you screaming inside of your mind. It's rather loud. I did not listen intentionally, but-" 

"No, no, it's fine," said Damen, who was reeling from this. Jokaste. Jokaste. His former lover, and now Kastor's bride, working against Auguste, against him. "Yes, I know her. Go on." 

"I... yes, alright." Torveld nodded, although from his expression he could still hear the myriad of thoughts screaming out from Damen. "It appears this Aimeric has been bringing Jokaste here, once a day, to speed up the natural passage of time in his body, so it could be months, maybe even a year, inside of his body with his powers unused." 

"Is there a way to reverse it? Does he still have his powers, can he work on getting them back?" Laurent asked, and Damen was torn between asking more about Auguste and demanding other information about the coup. 

"Once he wakes up, he needs to start practicing again, but if he practices enough, he should be restored to full power."  

Laurent remained as stoic as ever but Damen knew he was immensely relieved. A ruler without powers was almost unimaginable. "Can you come with us to Ios? If there is going to be a battle, we'll need a telepath to block any of their telepathic attacks."  

Torveld nodded. "Yes, of course." 

"Doesn't this interfere with your politics?" asked Damen, who was trying to steel himself back into being a prince instead of betrayed brother, jilted lover, and fatherless son.  

"No, I'm free to do as I please, essentially, minus treason," said Torveld, who then bowed shortly to the two of them. "I will speak with the healer now. Please excuse me." He ducked out of the tent.  

Laurent leaned over Auguste and pressed his forehead to his brother's. "Auguste, we'll fix this. Okay?" His voice trembled, and Damen remembered that Laurent had never trained to be a leader, but to follow Auguste. This must   

Damen did not touch Laurent, given his latest reaction, but instead stepped near Auguste and said, "Laurent, we have to talk. We need a plan to get Kastor off of the throne."  

"You need to be back in Ios, and I assume my uncle is there too. We will give half a day to ready this camp to move out and ride to Ios."

"So that's your debt to be repaid by the Vaskians." 

"Yes."

Damen then wondered if, years ago, Laurent had saved the encampment out of goodness or political machinery. Looking at his cold, sharp face, he wasn't sure if either was one hundred percent true. 

"You need to tell me more about this noble, Jokaste, and how her power works." 

Damen's gut wrenched, and he tried not to think about the hours spent with her as she sped up and slowed down his body's natural processes. Agonizingly teasing him until the moment where she suddenly brought it all crashing to a climax, over and over. He had never thought she would use her power for anything beyond her lovers, or to dry her clothes, or to speed up the growth of her flowers and then sustain them throughout the year.  

"She has the power to accelerate or delay the effect of time on an object. She can bring a flower to grow in minutes, or make her clothes dry in the sun in seconds, or..." He desperately tried to find a reference that didn't involve him and her, tangled in each other. 

"Or use it for silly sex games, I imagine." Laurent's face was unreadable.

Damen flushed. "So you know."

"By the way you reacted, it was obvious." His tone was metallic, blunt. Even though he was gently touching Auguste's hair, as if to make sure he was really there, he was still the Ice Prince. 

"You would be the same way, if it was an old lover of yours," Damen shot back, defensive.

Laurent, if possible, got even colder, and his lovely mouth twisted into a grimace. 

"She left me for Kastor - rather, I found out when I found them together." If Torveld was within mind-scream range, he probably had a wicked headache at this point. Not that Damen cared overly much. The hurt was still too raw to process correctly, but he could do nothing but watch as Jokaste had floated around the palace, moving her things to Kastor's quarters. 

"So she wanted to be queen, and picked the brother who would be King. So she knew well before you did of this treason. Possibly even when she was in bed with you."  

The rage in Damen's stomach boiled over, and he snapped, "At least I've been loved. I don't suppose your lovers couldn't get close to you when you slept covered in ice?"  

Laurent didn't respond, but stood there, eyes burning angrily, and then, without a glance at either Auguste or Damen, stomped out. After a glance to see if Auguste was still sleeping, Damen followed to find Halvik and Kashel to outline a plan to get them to Ios. 


End file.
